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Hotwells railway station

Bristol Port Railway and PierBristol building and structure stubsDisused railway stations in BristolFormer Great Western Railway stationsPages with no open date in Infobox station
Railway stations in Great Britain closed in 1921Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1865South West England railway station stubsUse British English from May 2017
Clifton Suspension Bridge & the A4 Portway (geograph 2489043)
Clifton Suspension Bridge & the A4 Portway (geograph 2489043)

Hotwells railway station, was a railway station situated in the suburb of Hotwells in Bristol, England. It was the original southern terminus of the Bristol Port Railway and Pier which ran to a station and pier at Avonmouth. The station opened in 1865, originally named Clifton station, and was situated in the Avon Gorge almost underneath the Clifton Suspension Bridge, near the Clifton Rocks Railway, the Hotwells terminus of Bristol Tramways, the Rownham ferry and landing stages used by passenger steamers. In 1871 the railway company was acquired by the Great Western Railway who created a tunnel under Clifton Down and linked the Port and Pier line to Bristol Temple Meads railway station. This left the Hotwells branch as a stub. The station remained open, renamed as Hotwells until 1921 when it and the track to Sneyd Park were removed to enable the building of the Portway road.The only trace remaining today is a short tunnel under Bridge Valley Road which was used during the Second World War as an air raid shelter. Overcrowding became such a problem that Bristol City Council had to institute a permit system. In later years, until 1996 part of the tunnel was used by a local gun club as a short range.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Hotwells railway station (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Hotwells railway station
Hotwell Road, Bristol Hotwells

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Wikipedia: Hotwells railway stationContinue reading on Wikipedia

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Latitude Longitude
N 51.455854 ° E -2.627204 °
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Hotwells

Hotwell Road
BS8 4DU Bristol, Hotwells
England, United Kingdom
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Clifton Suspension Bridge & the A4 Portway (geograph 2489043)
Clifton Suspension Bridge & the A4 Portway (geograph 2489043)
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Clifton Suspension Bridge
Clifton Suspension Bridge

The Clifton Suspension Bridge is a suspension bridge spanning the Avon Gorge and the River Avon, linking Clifton in Bristol to Leigh Woods in North Somerset. Since opening in 1864, it has been a toll bridge, the income from which provides funds for its maintenance. The bridge is built to a design by William Henry Barlow and John Hawkshaw, based on an earlier design by Isambard Kingdom Brunel. It is a Grade I listed building and forms part of the B3129 road. The idea of building a bridge across the Avon Gorge originated in 1753. Original plans were for a stone bridge and later iterations were for a wrought iron structure. In 1831, an attempt to build Brunel's design was halted by the Bristol riots, and the revised version of his designs was built after his death and completed in 1864. Although similar in size and design, the bridge towers are not identical, the Clifton tower having side cut-outs, the Leigh tower more pointed arches atop a 110-foot (34 m) red sandstone-clad abutment. Roller-mounted "saddles" at the top of each tower allow movement of the three independent wrought iron chains on each side when loads pass over the bridge. The bridge deck is suspended by 162 vertical wrought-iron rods in 81 matching pairs. The Clifton Bridge Company initially managed the bridge under licence from a charitable trust. The trust subsequently purchased the company shares, completing this in 1949 and took over the running of the bridge using the income from tolls to pay for maintenance. The bridge is a distinctive landmark, used as a symbol of Bristol on postcards, promotional materials, and informational web sites. It has been used as a backdrop to several films and television advertising and programmes. It has also been the venue for significant cultural events such as the first modern bungee jump in 1979, the last Concorde flight in 2003 which flew over the bridge, and a handover of the Olympic Torch relay in 2012.